I Cannot Do This Again
by MentalSarcasm
Summary: Sam's on Daniel ascending.


I Can't Do This Again  
  
Daniel's ascended. That's what we have to say. Because he's not dead, not really. That's what Colonel O'Neill says at least, and Teal'C. But then when you die you become an angel, which is a type of ascension, right?  
  
I've lost too many people in my life. And now I've lost the man I loved like a brother. The man who rang me every Saturday night to ask if I wanted to get coffee on Sunday morning. The man who changed me view, I told him I see things differently because I do. I grew up in a military family, as American as apple pie. Daniel showed me there's so such thing as normal, all there is, is life, and how we live it.  
  
I remember when my Mum died. She was a great woman my Mum, my Dad was always off somewhere, training cadets, flying planes, organising duty rotas, but Mum was always there. But no one told me how sick she was. Dad said she had to go into hospital for a quick operation, in and out and she'd been back home in a few days. A few days turned into a week, a fortnight, a month. And then he came home and told me she'd died. I couldn't believe it, wouldn't believe it. I thought she'd just fallen asleep and no one had realised and she'd wake up laughing and come home and teach me how to bake cookies.  
  
The night after my Dad had gone out and my grandparents had come round to look after my brother and me. I ran down to the bottom of our big garden, my feet hitting the ground hard each time, like I wanted to hurt the earth, and then I stood and screamed at the sky. I screamed at God for taking my mum away, I screamed at the sky that took up so much of my Dad's time that he hadn't spent more time at home with us. I screamed at my Mum for never letting me have the chance to say goodbye. No one told me how sick she was, I didn't know why. I remember my Gran rushing down the garden thinking I'd hurt myself badly because I was screaming so much. She couldn't believe that I was screaming at God. She let me scream until my throat was sore and then she hugged me and wouldn't let go, I thought she'd tell me off for blaspheming but she didn't, she just hugged me.  
  
I know she told my Dad about it, because after the funeral he tried asking me if I wanted to see a counsellor. I wanted to scream again and hit him, I thought if he'd been home more he'd have noticed Mum being sick a lot sooner and she'd have gone to a doctor sooner, and then she'd be at home with us instead of in a box in the cold earth. Instead I told him I didn't want to see anyone and then I left the room. I wanted to run away, but I didn't know where to go. My other grandparents died in a car crash before I was born so I couldn't go to them, and my aunt lived in Dublin and I wasn't sure how to get to Ireland. So I went up to my room and hid in the back of my wardrobe until everyone had left.  
  
I don't remember much about my brother at the time, I don't think he really understood what death meant, and my grandfather made a big fuss over him, as did my Dad.  
  
My teachers knew about it, how could they not? A pupil's mother dies and they're told in case the kid starts crying in classes or hides in the loos. My science teacher, Mr Kirkland, was pretty cool. He kept me behind after class when I went back to school and said his mother died just before he graduated from High School and he knew what I was going through. Then he lent me the book that changed my life. It was about space, or what they knew at the time anyway. I read it in one night and wanted to know more. I read every book on the subject that I could get my hands on, begged my Dad to let me go to astronomy classes on Saturday nights. Burying myself in this obsession helped me forget the pain of losing Mum.  
  
I read about astronomers, scientists, and astronauts. I wanted to be one. But then I'd have to join the armed forces. I wanted to be closer to Dad, so I picked the USAF.  
  
Dad looked like I'd slapped him round the face when I told him. He wanted my brother to take after him, not me. I was just meant to get married and have a family, like a good girl. But I couldn't, now I knew what lay out there I had to be part of it. My Gran encouraged me, she said my Mum would want me to be happy, and not follow my Dad's chauvinistic views. That clinched it. I signed up.  
  
I became a woman in a mans world, and a scientist. I gave up everything, sweetness, girly stuff, the ability to cook, and my belief in God. If you want to be a good astrophysicist then you can't be religious, you'll doubt everything put before you.  
  
I was top of my class, I worked in the Pentagon, I designed the programme to run the Stargate. I joined SG-1. I was happy.  
  
Then my Dad dropped the bombshell, he had cancer. I couldn't believe that, the same way I'd cast doubt on my Mum's death. Then, instead of losing him to a disease, I lost him to the Tok'ra. Oh I know he's alive, but it's not the same. We can't talk properly anymore, the distance between us has grown too much.  
  
So I made SG-1 my new family. With Daniel at my brother. And now I've lost him. Why is it that people have to leave me? I lost my Mum, my Dad, Martouf, Nareem, the other ascended guy who built his very own Stargate in my basement! And now Daniel, my Daniel. He taught me more than I could ever get out of a book. You can know science and have a belief he said once, when Martouf died he was the one who hugged me and told me I would find someone, I just had to wait. When me and Colonel O'Neill realised we wanted something we could never have Daniel was the one who came round and hugged me, and told me I was too good for anyone in the military, let alone Jack.  
  
I want my brother back. I want my Mum back. I want a hug.  
  
I can't lose anyone else, I can't go through this huge aching grief alone again.  
  
I can't do it. 


End file.
